Northern Indiana’s South Shore Projects Push Forward as Construction Season Gets Underway

Indiana South Shore Line

The $950 million Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District project's West Lake Corridor commuter railroad work is roughly one-quarter complete, with crews continuing site and structural work.

The completion timeline for construction remains set on November of 2024, however recent “headwinds” will necessitate some catching up, according to NICTD President Michael Noland’s report to the railroad’s Board of Trustees on March 27.

Two sites near the south end of the new line where West Lake intersects CSX freight tracks require coordination with the railroad, and environmental remediation work in north Hammond has added time and costs at that end of the new rail line, according to The Times of Northwest Indiana. 

The West Lake Corridor will run beneath the CSX tracks near the Munster-Dyer station, then over the tracks just north of 45th Street at Munster’s Maynard Junction.

The NICTD board also boosted the amount of funding available to deal with environmental issues by $5 million in order to mitigate difficulties at a former trucking company and junkyard site, the report said. 

The NICTD is holding the design-build joint venture F.H. Paschen Ragnar Benson to a late 2024 deadline, with positive train control implementation, testing, and commissioning scheduled to take until May 2025, according to Noland. 

The South Shore Line Double Track project is likewise on track for completion this November, followed by testing that will allow the railroad to begin enhanced, faster service to Chicago in May of 2024.

In addition, the NICTD board has selected a construction manager for a project in Chicago connected to the additional service to be provided by West Lake and Double Track. Lakeshore Engineering of Chicago will receive more than $1 million to represent NICTD on a project that would add a mainline track to the Metra Electric District line’s approach to downtown Chicago stations. 

The project is expected to cost around $150 million, with NICTD providing approximately 85% of the funds. Officials anticipate that the additional track and platform improvements will aid in accommodating the 26 trains that the South Shore will bring to daily traffic at the Van Buren and Millennium stations. The Metra line now has four tracks until it reaches the stations, when it drops to three.